Nafplio Doors

Like most places in Greece the buildings are mostly white, tan, or a soft yellow, they dress up their houses with their front doors, always a welcome look.

Nafplio photos

We went for a hike up to an old Venetian castle, great views of the old city of Nafplio. We had a nice lunch at the waterfront and went for a last swim in the  Mediteranian . We take a bus back to Athens tommorow and fly out the next day. We've been traveling for a month, we are ready to go home. The trip home will take a couple of days: Nafplio - Athens- London  where we spend the night then Boston. 

Nafplio

We are staying in the Port of Nafplio, an old Venitian  trading town popular with Greeks for a weekend getaway from Athens, 2 hours drive away. Lots of narrow streets with no cars, our tiny hotel is located one street back from the harbour.  Our second floor room has a balcony hanging over the street in the back,  with the less than quiet locals socializing rather late. English speaking Greeks can sometimes hard to find , conversing with our innkeeper has been a challenge. It's all so different than Crete, more sophisticated, wealthier,more crowded, but all very nice. 

Olympia

Olympia was nothing like I expected . I thought the early games  were small groups of arheletes competing in front of a few people. Olympia was a small city with  huge gymnasiums, temples, massive fountains. heated baths, housing, etc, the games were a BIG deal. The stadium is awe inspiring. We entered through arched gates ( where the athletes did ) . It's about the size of a football field. The surrounding sloped fields were for spectators, holding  45,000 people. The only stone seats were for the judges. Karen stands at the starting line, a marble strip. Winners at the ancient games received land, front row seats at the theater and future games, and were forgiven all taxes for life . 

An earthquake destroyed the city around the birth of Christ. 

Amphitheater of Epodorous

On our drive to Olympia, we stopped at Epodorous , the best surviving open air theater of Ancient Greece . Built over 3000 years ago, it's in almost perfect condition, we arrived early with almost no one there. I stood in the center of the circle at the bottom, the stage floor, Karen walked up to the back top row ( see her with umbrella in the photo above  ? ) when I spoke in a normal voice , she could hear me clearly ! The acoustics were PERFECT, an astounding engineering feat. The city of Epodorous was the birthplace of modern medicine. 

Mountains of Greece

We hired a driver to take us to Olympia, on the way we drove through the mountains. Much taller than our Vermont mountains, they reminded us of parts of Colorado. The leaves were changing, it

made us homesick . The rare towns were small and beautiful, all stone buildings with red tile roofs, they were untouched by time, we felt like staying. 

Back in Athens

We are in Athens for a couple days before we head up north along the coast . I picked a small hotel in a non tourist area, a middle class neighborhood . We had lunch at one of the many sidewalk cafés and then visited the wonderful Athens Museum of Archeology, that's a 3500 year old statue of Zues, 12ft tall, he's missing his lightning bolt. The Greek police look more like military soldiers, paratrooper boots, cargo pants, etc. they seem friendly.

 

Santorini hotel

This has been by far the fanciest place we have stayed on this trip. Our Hotel, Astra  Suites, is rated one of the 25 best hotels in the world by Tripadvisor. It's located on the highest point in Santorini , with over the top service. We place breakfast orders from a generous menu the nite before which is delivered to our private balcony at a time of our choosing the next morning. The hotel is full.

Last Supper

We depart from our group tommorow , we are off on our own for the last week. Our Santorini hotel prepared an outdoor dinner for our group, our last  supper together. A Greek woman played folk songs , a nice touch. The multi course meal included a nice grilled fish plus traditional Santorini dishes ( similar to Crete ) . We made some good friends in the group but are looking forward to exploring the Pelopanese peninsula alone, our usual mode of travel. We fly back to Athens at 7AM

Sailing in the Caldera

We spent the day sailing out to the volcano cone in the middle of the huge bay. The old wooden sailing ship was about 80-90 feet long. We hiked to the top of the active volcano where super hot gases leaked from the rocks, in places the ground was too hot to touch. The last erruption was 1940, they said its due for another one. This volcano had a massive erruption 3500 years ago which ended the Monoan civilization on Crete. Check out the Santorini waterfront at the base of the cliffs where we boarded the sailboat. Donkeys carry people up and down the cliff , Karen and I opted to hike. The ship played Zorba the Greek music on our way back, everybody did the Greek dance

Santorini Architecture

There are no beaches on Santorini. The town is built hanging over the sheer cliffs, 1000 feet above the caldera , a huge central lagoon surrounding the collapsed volcanic cone sticking out of the blue water. The buildings are stepped down the slope, each floor projecting out below the one above. From a distance, they look like snow covered mountains. At nite they appear like jeweled frosting on a cake. The effect is beautiful and unique. Long stone paved

paths and stairways connect the laberinth of buildings, we got lost our first nite. 

Santorini

We were driven 2 hours from the south coast of Crete to the north where we boarded a high speed ferry for a 3 hour trip to the Island of Santorini .The island is a ring of land 16 miles across with a collapsed volcano cone in the center of the inner bay. A road rings the land on top with hotels built on the sheer cliffs surrounding the inner bay. Everything is white with blue shutters, much like Loutro. This is a European hot spot, the hotels are all full, cruise ships stop here, lots of nice restaurants. A pricey place.  Our hotel is super nice, our tile floors are wild colors with nice artwork on the walls, quite a change from Crete. We are here for 4 days.